The Frenchman’s emotion on hearing this tale was such that I have loved him ever since. Clive in want! Why had he not sent to his friend? Grands Dieux! Clive who had helped him in his greatest distress! Clive’s father, ce preux chevalier, ce parfait gentilhomme! In a hundred rapid exclamations Florac exhibited his sympathy, asking of Fate, why such men as he and I were sitting surrounded by splendours—before golden vases crowned with flowers—with valets to kiss our feet—(those were merely figures of speech in which Paul expressed his prosperity)—whilst our friend the Colonel, so much better than we, spent his last days in poverty, and alone.
I liked Florac none the less, I own, because that one of the conditions of the Colonel’s present life, which appeared the hardest to most people, affected Florac but little. To be a Pensioner of an Ancient Institution? Why not? Might not a man retire without shame to the Invalides at the close of his campaigns, and, had not Fortune conquered our old friend, and age and disaster overcome him? It never once entered Thomas Newcome’s head; nor Clive’s, nor Florac’s, nor his mother’s, that the Colonel demeaned himself at all by accepting that bounty; and I recollect Warrington sharing our sentiment and trowling out those noble lines of the old poet:—
“His golden locks time hath to silver turned;
O time too swift, O swiftness never ceasing!
His youth ’gainst time and age hath ever spurned,
But spurned in vain; youth waneth by encreasing.
Beauty, strength, youth, are flowers but fading seen.
Duty, faith, love, are roots, and ever green.
“His helmet now shall make a hive for bees,
And lovers’ songs be turned to holy psalms;
A man at arms must now serve on his knees,
And feed on prayers, which are old age’s alms.”
These, I say, respected our friend, whatever was the coat he wore; whereas, among the Colonel’s own kinsfolk, dire was the dismay, and indignation even, which they expressed when they came to hear of this, what they were pleased to call degradation to their family. Clive’s dear mother-in-law made outcries over the good old man as over a pauper, and inquired of Heaven, what she had done that her blessed child should have a mendicant for a father? And Mrs. Hobson, in subsequent confidential communication with the writer of these memoirs, improved the occasion religiously as her wont was; referred the matter to Heaven too, and thought fit to assume that the celestial powers had decreed this humiliation, this dreadful trial for the Newcome family, as a warning to them all that they should not be too much puffed up with prosperity, nor set their affections too much upon things of this earth. Had they not already received one chastisement in Barnes’s punishment, and Lady Clara’s awful falling away? They had taught her a lesson, which the Colonel’s lamentable errors had confirmed,—the vanity of trusting in all earthly grandeurs! Thus it was this worthy woman plumed herself, as it were, on her relative’s misfortunes; and was pleased to think the latter were designed for the special warning and advantage of her private family. But Mrs. Hobson’s philosophy is only mentioned by the way. Our story, which is drawing to its close, has to busy itself with other members of the house of The Newcomes.
My talk with Florac lasted for some time: at its close, when we went to join the ladies in the drawing-room, we found Ethel cloaked and shawled, and prepared for her departure with her young ones, who were already asleep. The little festival was over, and had ended in melancholy—even in weeping. Our hostess sate in her accustomed seat by her lamp and her worktable; but, neglecting her needle, she was having perpetual recourse to her pocket-handkerchief, and uttering ejaculations of pity between the intervals of her gushes of tears. Madame de Florac was in her usual place, her head cast downwards, and her hands folded. My wife was at her side, a grave commiseration showing itself in Laura’s countenance, whilst I read a yet deeper sadness in Ethel’s pale face. Miss Newcome’s carriage had been announced; the attendants had already carried the young ones asleep to the vehicle; and she was in the act of taking leave. We looked round at this disturbed party, guessing very likely what the subject of their talk had been, to which, however, Miss Ethel did not allude: but, announcing that she had intended to depart without disturbing the two gentlemen, she bade us farewell and good night. “I wish I could say a merry Christmas,” she added gravely, “but none of us, I fear, can hope for that.” It was evident that Laura had told the last chapter of the Colonel’s story.
Madame de Florac rose up and embraced Miss Newcome, and, that farewell over, she sank back on the sofa exhausted, and with such an expression of affliction in her countenance, that my wife ran eagerly towards her. “It is nothing, my dear,” she said, giving a cold hand to the younger lady, and sate silent for a few moments, during which we heard Florac’s voice without crying Adieu! and the wheels of Miss Newcome’s carriage when it drove away.
Our host entered a moment afterwards; and remarking, as Laura had done, his mother’s pallor and look of anguish, went up and spoke to her with the utmost tenderness and anxiety.
She gave her hand to her son, and a faint blush rose up out of the past as it were, and trembled upon her wan cheek. “He was the first friend I ever had in the world, Paul,” she said “the first and the best. He shall not want, shall he, my son?”
No signs of that emotion in which her daughter-in-law had been indulging were as yet visible in Madame de Florac’s eyes, but, as she spoke, holding her son’s hand in hers, the tears at length overflowed, and with a sob, her head fell forwards. The impetuous Frenchman flung himself on his knees before his mother, uttered a hundred words of love and respect for her, and with tears and sobs of his own called God to witness that their friend should never want. And so this mother and son embraced each other, and clung together in a sacred union of love, before which we who had been admitted as spectators of that scene, stood hushed and respectful.
That night Laura told me, how, when the ladies left us, the talk had been entirely about the Colonel and Clive. Madame de Florac had spoken especially, and much more freely than was her wont. She had told many reminiscences of Thomas Newcome, and his early days; how her father taught him mathematics when they were quite poor, and living in their dear little cottage at Blackheath; how handsome he was then, with bright eyes, and long black hair flowing over his shoulders; how military glory was his boyish passion, and he was for ever talking of India, and the famous deeds of Clive and Lawrence. His favourite book was a history of India—the history of Orme. “He read it, and I read it also, my daughter,” the French lady said, turning to Ethel; “ah! I may say so after so many years.”